


Stay with Me

by Snarky_Warden



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M, Light Angst, Nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:48:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28495599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snarky_Warden/pseuds/Snarky_Warden
Summary: Zevwarden Week 2020: La Petit Mort - DeathThe eve of the final battle, Zevran is plagued by fears. Now that a real future lies in his grasp, he has so much more to lose.
Relationships: Zevran Arainai/Female Tabris, Zevran Arainai/Female Warden
Comments: 3
Kudos: 11
Collections: ZevWarden Week 2020





	Stay with Me

Zevran woke with a start. He looked around the empty room for whatever caused his sudden sleep disruption. Not a sight nor sound. Not even his warden in bed. His warden, who was a sounder sleeper than himself and rarely stirred beyond darkspawn dreams. Where was she? Heaviness settled on his chest, and he felt he could hardly breathe.

There was a battle to fight tomorrow.

Quickly Zevran pulled on his trousers and shirt, slipped bare feet into boots to wander down the halls of the castle. Before he even got through the door, he realized with a start that her bag was gone. The worn out pack had been propped haphazardly against the wardrobe, he was sure of it. 

Not in the castle then.

Worry squeezed his heart and he strode purposefully down the halls. Familiar, yet different. Something unsettling crept up his spine but as he tried to hold onto the thought, it slipped through his fingers like smoke.

So lost in his head, he abruptly looked up before running nearly headlong into-

“Alistair!” Zevran exclaimed in relief. “By the Maker, I was beginning to feel like I had lost my head. Have you seen the warden, perchance?” Surely if the other warden was wandering at this hour he would have seen where she went.

Alistair frowned in confusion. He hesitated, waited a beat before speaking slowly. “You mean… are you talking about Kallian?”

“Yes, of course I mean Kallian,” Zevran snapped back. “You know, small in stature, blonde hair, impish grin? _That_ Kallian?” he continued on, sarcastically.

“Zev,” Alistair’s voice cracked, and his face fell. “Don’t you- you remember, right?” his voice dropped to a near whisper.

Only the steel cage of his ribs kept his heart from totally bursting out of his own chest. His next breath hurt. And the one after. “What are you talking about.”

“Kallian’s gone, Zev. She died in the battle. It’s been _months_.”

Zevran’s head spun and he clutched his chest over his heart. This wasn’t right. Wasn’t possible. He remembered… he remembered… But he couldn’t recall the end of the battle. The end of the Blight even. Surely it hadn’t happened yet!

“The Blight,” Zevran said urgently, gripping Alistair by the upper arms. “What about the Blight?”

“Zev… you’re scaring me,” Alistair said in alarm. “If this is some kind of sick joke, I-”

“It is no joke. Tell me.”

“She’s the one who fought the archdemon - and died so we could win.” Alistair carefully pulled Zevran’s hands off of himself. “You were there, Zevran. You went to her… _funeral_ ,” he whispered the last word.

Funeral. No. Not dead. Not after he’d just found her. They didn’t get enough _time_.

“Zev?” Alistair placed a heavy hand on his shoulder. 

His breathing spiked into a frenzy, like he couldn’t get enough air. Like someone was sitting on him and crushing his lungs. It hurt. 

“But she’s… I didn’t get a chance.” 

His heart thudded in his ears and he reached for the cold stone of the wall, pressed his back against it, focused on the sharp edges that dug into his spine and scraped at his shirt. It was too real. The grit of carved stone against his palm was as real as the woven carpet beneath his feet. He sank to the floor.

Alistair followed. “This is the second time this has happened. I know you didn’t take it well, none of us did… But I’m worried.”

“I-it just doesn’t feel real. I remember - I _held_ her in my arms just last-” he shook his head. It wasn’t last night. It just wasn’t. But he remembered the curve of her body against him, her radiating warmth and the softness of her hips and thighs. Her muted snoring in the depth of sleep that he could recall from memory in a heartbeat. 

“We were-” Zevran couldn’t say it. He choked down the words - _to be married_. An entire future laid out before him, and in every step was Kallian and her brilliant smile and sweet giggle that made his heart soar. His sun.

Pain finally registered to him as he realized he was clenching his fists so hard that his nails were digging into his palms. It felt like a dream - a terrible nightmare, really. But he couldn’t seem to wake from this one.

“They’re building a monument to her, you know,” Alistair said quietly. “No one in Ferelden will forget her. At least take comfort that she’s going down in history. The Hero of the Fifth Blight.”

“History never favours elves fondly,” Zevran said bitterly. “You Fereldans can take your history and shove it where the sun doesn’t shine. That won’t bring Kallian back. It won’t bring her here. It won’t let me feel her, run my fingers through her hair, and hear her laughter!” 

His throat closed and a choked gasp escaped him. Grief threatened to swallow him all at once in an endless ocean. Rinna. Taliesen. _Kallian_. One by one he outlived them all. At what point did the Maker stop playing games with him and take his cursed soul already?

“What am I still doing here,” he rasped, throat still raw and choked. His eyes stung and he rubbed the heels of his palms against them until he saw spots of coloured lights in the backs of his eyelids.

“Get up,” Alistair said suddenly. “Get up!” he shouted.

With a jolt, Zevran sat upright, staring into the dark of his room. Sweat drenched his back and stuck his hair to his forehead and neck. 

“Zev!”

Kallian. Wordlessly, he lunged at her, wrapped his arms around her body and squeezed tight, breathed in her scent, felt the warmth of her skin on his. “Mi amor,” he murmured over and over between plastering her shoulder with kisses.

It was a nightmare after all. His worst nightmare. Zevran could breathe again!

“Zev, love, what’s wrong?” she asked, bewildered and still half asleep.

“Nothing, nothing, mi amor,” he whispered and pulled away to look into her eyes - like pools of melted chocolate. 

And in waking, reality sank in. The battle had not yet come. His worst fears may still come true. “Just stay with me,” he breathed almost in prayer. “Just stay with me, Kallian.”


End file.
